Curriculum Vitae
University of Missouri--Columbia BA 1976
University of Missouri--Columbia MA 1979
University of Montana MFA 1982
Associate Professor of English: 1992-present.
ULM.
Director of Creative Writing Program: 1988-present. ULM.
Project Director, NEA-funded Writers in Residence Series: 1988-present.
ULM.
President Southern Literary Festival, 1999-2000.
Vice-President Southern Literary Festival, 1998-1999.
Assistant Professor of English: 1986-91. ULM.
Instructor of English: 1984-86. ULM.
Writer in Residence: 1982-84. Montana Arts Council.
Writer in Residence: 1979-80. Missouri Arts council.
Freshmen Composition
Introduction to Literature
Beginning Creative Writing
Survey of American Literature to 1861
Survey of American Literature from 1861
Survey of British Literature from 1790
Modern Poetry
Advanced Poetry Writing
Graduate Poetry Workshop
Graduate Seminar in Creative Writing for Teachers
Graduate Seminar in Forms and Theory
Graduate Seminar in American Poetry
Graduate Directed Study
Honors
Finalist for the Larry Levis Prize for Poetry, Missouri Review
Editors' Prize, 1999.
Semi-Finalist for University of Wisconsin Press' Brittingham &
Pollack Awards in Poetry, 1997.
Named to the Literature Panel for the Louisiana Division of the
Arts, 1995, 1996.
Winner of a Louisiana Division of the Arts $5,000. Fellowship,
1994.
Nominated by the ULM English Department for University Award in
Creative/Performing
Arts, 1989-90, 1990-91, 1991-92.
Named as Local Scholar/Coordinator for NEH-funded Poets in Person
Program at Ouachita
Public Library, 1992.
Nominated for General Electric Young Writer's Award, 1985.
Runner-up for the Richard Hugo Memorial Award, 1985.
Winner of the Montana First Book Award, 1984.
Honorable Mention in the Loring Williams Academy of American Poets
Prize, 1982.
Winner of the Mahan Award for Poetry, 1978.
Books (Poetry)
The Bad Caddie.
Currently under consideration at several publishers/ book awards.
74 pp.
The Map of Leaving. Winner of the Montana First Book Award.
Arrow Graphics & Typography, Missoula, Montana, 1984. 52 pp.
Journals and Newspapers:
Poetry
The Chattahoochee Review (Spring, 2000)
"Call It Anything But Luck"
The Missouri Review (Spring, 2000)
"The Bad Caddie," "Pan-Olympic," "The
Cat Scan," "Friday Night Fights," "Elegy"
Blue Mesa Review
(forthcoming--accepted11/10/99)
"Amnesia," "Adolescence"
Chiron Review
(forthcoming--accepted 10/11/99)
"A Portrait of His Failure as Desire"
Pegasus (Summer,
1999)
"Northern Lights"
Green Mountains Review (Winter, 1999)
"Local Hope"
In Your Face
(Summer, 1998)
"Election Year"
Sonora Review
(Spring, 1998)
"The Supplicant"
Willow Springs
(January, 1998)
"Claryville, Third Sundays in May"
Poetry East
(Spring, 1997)
"Domestic"
High Plains Literary Review (April, 1996)
"Luck," "Near Viola"
Louisiana Literature (Spring, 1995)
"Sadness the Gardener Sows"
Hiram Poetry Review (Winter, 1995)
"Icarus," "I-90 East, Exit 120," "Wind
River Canyon"
Red Dirt (Spring,
1991)
"The Cobbler's Journal"
Kentucky Poetry Review (Winter 1990-1991)
"Her Letter from a Convent near Ste. Genevieve, 1861"
Poetry Northwest (Winter, 1990)
"The Color of Money"
New Mexico Humanities Review (Winter, 1988)
"Running the HiLine"
Mississippi Mud (Summer,
1985)
"Sinkholes"
Cutbank
(Spring, 1985)
"Sawmill," "The Sleepwalker"
Seattle Times (Fall,
1984 )
"Another City"
Oregonian (Fall,
1984)
"Train Whistles"
Antioch Review
(Fall, 1984)
"Respect the Birds"
Mississippi Mud (Winter,
1983)
"Acushla Mae," "Waking on a Clear Night in Missoula
Poetry Now
(December, 1983)
"The Map of Leaving"
Bloomsbury Review (November, 1983)
"Mules"
Sou'wester (Summer,
1983)
"Names We Thought Our Own"
Permafrost
(Spring, 1983)
"Lust"
The Missouri Review (Spring, 1983)
"Two Figures in Mt. Hope Cemetery"
Porch (Spring,
1983)
"The Hitchhiker"
Midlands
(Spring, 1979)
"Poem," "Arrival"
Review La Booche
(Fall, 1978)
"Nothing to Do," "Daybreak"
Midlands (Spring,
1978)
"The Ghost of Coronado," "Violins for Two,"
"Mules"
Anthologies:
A Fine Excess: Literature at Play. (forthcoming, Sarabande
Books, January, 2001) "Local Hope"
Anthology of Magazine Verse & Yearbook of American Poetry,
1995-6. (Monitor Books, 1997)
"Wind River Canyon"
Crossing the Water: Poets of the Western United States.
(Permanent Press, 1987)
"Good News," "The Treasure of the Raccoons,"
"Mules"
Voices from the Interior: Poets from Missouri. (Bookmark
Press, 1982)
"Mules"
Reviews:
The News Star (10/15/94)
"On William Ryan"
The Missoulian (8/1/86)
"On William Pitt Root"
The St. Petersburg Times (July, 1983)
"On David Bottoms"
Montana Review of Books (Summer, 1983)
"Recent Tributes to Richard Hugo"
CutBank (Spring, 1982)
"On Lee Bassett," "On Rich Ives"
CutBank (Fall, 1981)
"On David Long," "On Lex Runciman"
Essays:
"On Description," Models of Composition: A Practical Guide for Effective Writing, 3rd Edition. Ed., Jeff Galle. (Harcourt, Brace & Co., 1998)
Faculty Advisor for Helicon, NLU's student
literary magazine, 1989-present.
Preliminary Judge for the AWP Award Series in Poetry, 1985.
Guest Editor for Porch Anniversary Issue, 1982.
Editor of CutBank, 1980-82. Editorial Assistant for The Missouri
Review, 1977-79.
Northeast Louisiana Poetry Society, Biedenharn
Museum, Monroe, Louisiana
Lost Bazaar Gallery, Monroe, Louisiana
University of Missouri
University of Montana
College of Great Falls
Missoula Valley Reading Series
University of Louisiana at Monroe
South Central Modern Language Association, Houston
Enoch's Cafe Reading Series, Shreveport
Kisatchie Gallery Reading Series, Shreveport
Masur Museum, Monroe, Louisiana
Left Bank Reading Series, Monroe, Louisiana
University Service/Committees
College of Liberal Arts Distance Learning Committee, ULM, 1999-2000.
English Department Tenure Committee, Chairman, ULM, 1999-2000.
English Department Search Committee for Modernist, ULM 1998-99.
English Department Recruitment Committee, Chairman, ULM, 1997-present.
English Department Ad Hoc Committee for Faculty Evaluation, ULM,
1996
College of Liberal Arts Committee for Faculty Research Awards,
ULM, 1994-present.
English Department Promotion Committee, ULM, 1994-present.
English Department Tenure Committee, ULM, 1994-present.
English Department Committee for Review of Graduate Faculty Membership,
ULM, 1994-present.
English Department Curriculum Committee, ULM, 1990-present.
English Department Freshmen Issues Committee, 1997-98.
English Department Graduate Admissions Committee, ULM, 1990-1997.
Dean's Search Committee for Head, Department of English, ULM,
1994.
Dean's Search Committee for Head, Department of English, ULM,
1991-92.
English Department Search Committee for Generalist, ULM, 1990.
Dean's Search Committee for Head, Department of English, ULM,
1990.
English Department Search Committee for Fiction Writer, ULM, 1989.
Graduate Faculty in English, ULM, 1986-present.
Mr. William Pitt Root, Professor of English,
Hunter College
Dr. John Vignaux Smyth, Head, English Department Portland State
University
Dr. David Jeffrey, Assistant Provost, James Madison University
Dr. Carlos Fandal, Dean of Liberal Arts, University of Louisiana
at Monroe
Dr. Lea Olsan, Professor of English, University of Louisiana at
Monroe
Mr. Jack Myers, Professor of English and Director of Creative
Writing, Southern Methodist University
Mr. William Ryan, Associate Professor
of English, University of Louisiana at Monroe
Statement of Teaching Philosophy
I have benefitted from my experience with the educational systems in three different universities, in three different states, but before I begin to examine how these institutions have shaped my philosophy, I need to say something about my parents, both career public school teachers, who have had more to do with my pursuing a career in higher education than anybody else. In them I found models of diligence and professionalism, along with that enthusiasm that engenders learning. I have also had the good luck to study with writers and professors whose reputations live at the top of their generations: Larry Levis, William Pitt Root, Patricia Goedicke, James Welch, William Kittredge and Richard Hugo. In all of them I found a standard of honesty and ambition, a commitment to integrity and discovery. To a degree I feel their almost tangible glances over my shoulder, ready to motivate or admonish.
While a teaching assistant at the University of Missouri, then at Montana, four years total, I saw how writing and communication skills can indeed be taught, how they can empower personality and the sovereign right of the student to respond. Under the Director of Composition at Missouri, Dr. Winifred Horner, I followed a more "traditional" approach to Rhetoric, and then in Montana I was introduced and encouraged to try a more "progressive" approach, using workshops and peer editing, among other strategies. In my fifteen years of experience at ULM, I have used both and have not found the opposition between "traditional" and "progressive" to be terribly sharp. I have never felt nor addressed the teaching of English and its Grammar as the transference of some private, elite language which excludes or ridicules the student or his experience. That said, I nevertheless, believe in the defense of a language that is embattled by the adulterants of advertising, euphemism, estrangement, and professional posturing. I also believe that contemporary progressive tendencies toward interdisciplinary work, multiculturism, and so on, should not supersede a thorough education in the "canon" of western literature and culture.
Teaching the writing of poetry and fiction is problematical (No one teaches vision or discovery, let alone will and tenacity.), but I have found many methods of introducing techniques of craft and inspiration. I have taught creative writing classes from grades one through twelve in the Poetry-in-the-Schools Programs in Missouri and Montana, have taught workshops in prison, in community adult education classes, as well as at all levels of university instruction--beginning, advanced, and graduate--and I am constantly reminded and amazed that writing can touch and communicate that which is most deeply human and spiritual. In all the roundtable workshops which I have led, I never let my students forget their terrible responsibilities to language and standard, while never failing to encourage that which bears the spark of individual art and vision.